Promoted by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade together with the Secretary of State for Telecommunications, Ficod was set up in 2007. Its organisation was entrusted to Red.es and its purpose, within the framework of the Avanza Plan, is to develop and boost the Spanish Digital Content Industry, with special emphasis on Spanish speaking markets.

Promoted by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade together with the Secretary of State for Telecommunications, Ficod was set up in 2007. Its organisation was entrusted to Red.es and its purpose, within the framework of the Avanza Plan, is to develop and boost the Spanish Digital Content Industry, with special emphasis on Spanish speaking markets.

Are you forever struggling to juggle more demands and get more done? That's not about to change any time soon. Demand is rising inexorably. Here's the problem: we're not meant to run like computers -- at high speeds, continuously, for long periods of time. Rather, human beings are designed to pulse rhythmically between spending energy and intermittently renewing it. The sad truth is that most of us don't do either one very well. We may dimly recognize that we're more efficient and effective when we focus on one thing at a time, but we still react, with Pavlovian predictability, to every new call on our attention. Tony Schwartz, bestselling author of Be Excellent at Anything: The Four Keys to Transforming the Way We Work and Live, will lay out a step-by-step approach to a better way of working, grounded in multidisciplinary research and real-life stories.

Know how to use an iterative, incremental framework to create improvements in software? You can use those mad skillz to make your life more awesome too! Come learn and share how agile techniques can be used to achieve personal goals and lower your stress – and even to get the most out of SXSW. Ideas to discuss: • What day-to-day or minute-to-minute techniques will allow me to satisfy shorter-term goals while building up to bigger progress? • How can I exploit my little monkey brain to get it to actually do stuff that will make my life better? • How can I stay aligned to the big picture while working on today's challenges?

Senator Al Franken was born on May 21, 1951, and grew up in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. He graduated from Harvard in 1973, where he met his wife Franni. They've been married for 33 years, and have two children: daughter Thomasin, 28, and son Joe, 24. Al spent the last 37 years as a comedy writer, author, and radio talk show host and has taken part in seven USO tours, visiting our troops overseas in Germany, Bosnia, Kosovo and Uzbekistan - as well as visiting Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait four times. In 2008, Al was elected to the Senate as a member of the DFL (Democratic-Farmer-Labor) Party from Minnesota, and was sworn in July of 2009 following a statewide hand recount. He currently sits on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pension Committee; the Judiciary Committee; the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and the Committee on Indian Affairs. Al is a long-time advocate for affordable, accessible health care, an economy that works for our middle class, the protection of a secure retirement, the promise of a 21st century education for our kids, and the creation of a green economy that creates jobs and improves our environment.

What separates a good design from a bad design are the decisions that the designer made. Jared explores the five styles of design decisions, showing you when gut instinct produces the right results and when designers need to look to more user-focused research. You'll see how informed decisions play out against rule-based techniques, such as guidelines and templates. And Jared will show you the latest research showing how to hire great decision makers and find opportunities that match your style.

Panel Description: Barry Diller currently serves as the Chairman of Expedia and the Chairman and Senior Executive of IAC, a leading internet company that houses more than 50 businesses including Match.com, Citysearch, The Daily Beast, Vimeo, CollegeHumour, Electus and Ask.com. Prior to founding IAC, Mr. Diller served as chief executive for a number of companies engaged in media and interactivity including ABC Entertainment, Fox, Inc., QVC, Paramount Pictures Corporation and Paramount’s Entertainment and Communications Group which included such companies as Simon & Schuster, Madison Square Garden Corporation, and SEGA Enterprises, Inc.

Don't quit your big company job just yet to go work for that sexy startup. At this panel, seasoned professionals give their tips on how to successfully drive innovative ideas inside big companies. Whether you want to add social media to your company's web presence, adopt hot new technology, or have the next big business idea, we'll tell you how to accomplish it, even in the face of management that still prints out their email.

365 Days. 365 Voices "the3six5" started on January 1st, 2010 and ultimately crowdsourced the story of an entire year from the perspective of a different person each day. The authors come from a variety of backgrounds and geographic locations and together revealed our collective conscious of what took place over the course of 365 days. While the individual tales shared with the public were an amazing result, we'd like to share the learnings and anecdotes that happened behind the scenes of this seemingly simple (but quite the opposite) crowdsourced project that took us from nothing, to a published book. This session will serve those who are seeking to develop their own crowd-fueled web content by sharing the mistakes and revelations that the3six5 experiment taught us.

This dual presentation will explore common play elements in location-based games. We’ll analyze the popular "Check-In" mechanic (used by products like FourSquare and GoWalla), and take a look at the business and social forces that have influenced its emergence as the popular geo game model. The presentation will compare current location-based products, charting their strengths and weaknesses to identify where we believe large areas of opportunity exist in the market. We'll evaluate the challenges and untapped opportunities of Geo Games from the technological and design perspectives of the two presenters. We’ll outline how the limitations in location technology can be an elegant part of the game design itself, and how new innovations will help to create richer and more immersive parallel worlds.

Japan has ubiquitous high-speed coverage and a voracious appetite for tech gadgets, however, their tools have developed with entirely different features than other countries. For example: Japan's ""Galapo-phones"" commonly include streaming TV and multi-character sets, Mixii and Gree each have more than 30 million users on their social networks, and Yahoo is a whole different experience from US counter-part. With meteoric growth in Twitter and network tools, Japan aims on becoming the regional leader for emerging social web technologies -- much like their early leadership in consumer electronics and gaming industries. This presents opportunities for collaboration and partnerships but localizing requires more than translation. This panel will discuss the unique characteristics of Japanese web and mobile market including tactics for connecting to markets, identifying opportunities, and outreaching to audiences, plus understanding unexpected cultural nuances and consumer expectations.

Gone are the days when brands needed to rely on high profile stories to establish credibility—today, brand marketers become content curators by mingling content from trusted sources with their own material. Long gone is the need to purchase ad space in a relevant trade publication—instead, marketers just create their own site on the topic. At a time when the line is increasingly blurred between the role of marketer and publisher, it is a brave new world out there for brands. As part of a lively debate on what role brands should play in this brave new world, experts from the publishing, marketing, and internet worlds will come together to address some of the most heated concerns about this changing landscape—including matters of transparency and trust, concern over copyright and fair sharing, and where to draw the line between reporting and selling.

No matter how narrow you think the use of your website or service will be, if it's successful, it'll be used in ways you'll never expect - including life or death fights over human rights in foreign countries. Your code might make the difference between a free press or a government clampdown, tortured dissidents or a bloodless coup. Twitter aids activists in Iran; Facebook helps the independent press in Ethiopia; World of Warcraft is policed for sedition in China. What is happening on your site that you don't know about? And how can you design it so you help the good guys?

Can "tweeting" release Oxytocin? Does looking through your friends' Facebook photos or reading the newsfeed impact your mood? This panel will look at how the internet and social networking actually impacts how we feel and will explore opportunities for using technology to help people feel better. We'll discuss the current research as well as innovative sites, applications and other virtual interventions designed to improve our mental health with an emphasis on young people (16-24).

Every major forecast from McKinsey to The Gates Foundation points to cleantech as the Next Great Industry. It seems obvious, yet how many of us in the interactive community have deep knowledge and involvement in this sector? Our prediction and hope is that that will change in the next 3-5 years. This session will discuss the current growth of the cleantech sector, its implications for the interactive community and vice versa, the optimal scenarios for impact, and the ways we can start thinking about this industry now. We’ll dive into the current role of data and developers, the importance of mapping & the Internet of Things, and look at case studies from GE & IBM to TerraPower. We’ll also follow up on some of the principles in the SXSW 2010 keynotes of Valerie Casey & Bruce Sterling such as systems thinking in the interactive community, high-impact development, and our role in social & environmental change.

So you get the brief, and it’s the “same old same old”. Your client wants a banner campaign…an email blast, a :30 second spot… but you’ve got something better up your sleeve… something more appropriate for them that better meets their needs. Something they’re pining for but they don’t know it yet. How will you sell it to them without making their head spin? How can you make them understand the benefits without losing them in the technological weeds? We’re constantly being thrown for a loop when it comes to great, innovative ideas: “It’s not in the budget.”, “How can we measure its success?”, “We’ve never done anything like that before.” This panel will tell you how to crash through all those barriers with your client and make something really interesting – you may even put it in your portfolio.

The old way of thinking tells small businesses to worry about competitors. Worrying takes the focus off the business. By collaborating with competitors the focus remains on the client and business goals. Take for instance the WordPress theme design company StudioPress. StudioPress recommended other theme design companies to add to the Page.ly power ups page. Because of these actions and more, they've increased their recognition, branded themselves as a benevolent leader, and gained respect within the community. GangPlank, a collaborative workspace, started as a few web firms who decided to share their business secrets. They decided to combine their efforts and work together under the same roof. There was enough room for more so the space was opened up to the public. Now the space has increased from 5k sq ft to 16k sq ft and is funded by the city of Chandler. Learn these tactics and more from a highly qualified panel of experts who live this philosophy daily.

Reaching communities usually doesn’t include building an app or a Web site but creating a more tangible experience—And, inspiring those who are long lost to apathy to even consider taking part in this experience is the first and most difficult step. Designers often end up using stereotypical and common forms of serious, logical argument in communicating pertinent issues. But many designers have failed to acknowledge a common tool as one of the most powerful rhetorical strategies for use in their work: humor. Neglecting humor’s potential eliminates the chance of mastering a method of communication that has an unlimited usage scope because of its cultural role and human value.

New technology brings broad experimentation and new design challenges. It takes years, if not decades, to establish an effective design vocabulary to discuss what "works" and "doesn't work." This panel asks established professionals in architecture, speech writing, and event planning to describe their creative processes and vocabularies and will compare them with the best practices in interaction design.

PBS KIDS has been designing non-commercial websites and interactive games for kids for over 10 years. Making an interactive product that appeals, engages and is usable by a child is not as simple as using Comic Sans and replacing an “S” with a “Z”. Children's abilities change rapidly and producers need to ensure that products are developmentally accessible. This session will focus on designing for two audiences: pre-readers (3-5) and readers (6-8), through case-studies revealing how and why design choices were made based on experience, user testing and informed guesses.

J. Craig Venter is a biologist most known for his contributions, in 2001, of sequencing the first draft human genome and in 2007 for the first complete diploid human genome. In 2010 he and his team announced success in constructing the first synthetic bacterial cell. He is a founder and president of the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) and founder and CEO of the company, Synthetic Genomics Inc (JCVI). His present work focuses on creating synthetic biological organisms and applications of this work, and discovering genetic diversity in the world's oceans. Dr. Venter is the 2008 National Medal of Science and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He is the author of A Life Decoded: My Genome: My Life (Viking, 2007).

In this session, representatives from major browser vendors including Chrome, Microsoft, Opera and the W3C will pull back the curtain revealing some of the challenges with implementation and interoperability. The goal is to have designers and developers get a glimpse into how CSS has struggled and finally gained its footing as the presentation layer in everything we do for the Web.

Artists working with the Internet have to adapt, adopt, and respond to a continually developing medium with ever expanding potential. In this panel, we'll talk with leading artists about their practice and the current state of Internet art. Artists will discuss how recent developments, like the boom in online video, the proliferation of social media and mobile technologies, and the introduction of HTML5, have prompted new artistic strategies and aesthetics. The conversation will foreground how artists are often the first to experiment with and think through the new possibilities and limits of new technologies. Rhizome is a leading organization dedicated to Internet art. Rhizome supports artists working at the furthest reaches of technological experimentation as well as those responding to the broader aesthetic and political implications of new tools and media.

Pete Cashmore interviews Dennis Crowley about how a new wave of location-based applications are changing the way we interact with our friends and surroundings, as well as how these new mobile technologies, when combined with enhanced game dynamics, are helping people experience the world around them in new and different ways. They will also discuss some of the core ideas behind foursquare's approach, the company's vision of the future, and how products that create serendipity will play an important role going forward.

Back in 2003, photographer Robbie Cooper photographed dozens of portraits of online gameplayers alongside their avatars for a book called ALTER EGO. The book is an incredible illustration of the ways that digital platforms have transformed fixed physical characteristics into a virtual wardrobe that can be donned or dismissed with a few clicks of a button. This phenomenon might be trivial if online identity were all "just a game"—but the truth is, the line between online and offline identity has increasingly blurred. Researcher Lukas Blinka wrote in the journal Cyberpsychology in 2008 that “the data...shows that younger players tend to identify with — i.e. not to distinguish from — their avatars, and the younger the respondents were, the stronger the phenomenon." This panel will debate whether digital platforms can enhance racial engagement and understanding, or simply encourage conscienceless and consequence-free acts of hatred and abuse — and explore how online identity is forcing us to confront new ways of thinking about race, ethnicity and gender.

Ever wonder what keeps so many people from launching a new endeavor or scaling a creative venture into something exponentially more impactful? More often than not, the answer isn't a lack of ideas, money, a team or a plan...it's far more primal. The answer is fear. Instead of brainstorming new ideas, in this session you will discover how to move from ideation to action, overcome the three greatest fears that hold creatives, artists and entrepreneurs back, and find a more stable path to success.

The pictures are better on radio, they say, and the same is also true in interactive experiences: games, for example, are possible using sound that are more realistic and immersive than the most complex 3D polygon-fests. But we're not talking soundtrack: we're talking fundamental questions of user interface, augmented reality and game design in audio. We're focusing on the development of Papa Sangre, a game in sound without graphics, and the world's first real-time generative audio-only virtual world. On an iPhone. Papa Sangre was commissioned by 4IP as a game in which blind people might be able to kick the ass of sighted people. It’s been an extraordinary challenge to imagine the design of a game and world where your existence is entirely through sound and where technological constraints become a mother of invention. The panel will discuss the process, the constraints, the vision and the philosophy behind a radical new genre of game and what this generally reveals for good game and experience design.

Ever met a friend for a spur-of-the-moment drink just because Foursquare told you he was down the block? How about popped into a restaurant in a foreign city because your phone told you that you’d like it? Or got wind of a special product offer at the precise moment you were walking by your favorite store? If you haven’t yet, you will. And your life will be better for it. Here’s the deal: new location-aware technologies recognize where you are and connect you to the people and things that matter to you most. But you knew that already. What you don’t know is what’s next – how the next generation of mobile location-aware services are going to transform how you socialize, shop and experience entertainment in unimaginable new ways. Where a mobile device will know what you like, maybe even more than your best friend. And where you hold a virtual passport to new and spontaneous experiences in the palm of your hand. Dr. Tero Ojanperä of Nokia will lead a panel that propels you into the future of location-based services and gives you a first look at the products and services that will revolutionize how you connect with the world around you.

Art, education, economics, propaganda. Games are arriving at the forefront of media to become an important way to engage entire generations of people. What's different from before? Five billion people are replacing the most common communication device, the simple cell phone, with a full-fledged gaming system in their pocket. There are multiple ways to publish and distribute games over the Internet and to the masses. For many, game creation is becoming a regular activity, as tools become both easier to use and more powerful for people without programming knowledge. This panel will cover unique perspectives on how games are becoming more meaningful forms of expression and a significant tool for communicating ideas.

In just under 18 months Facebook has gone from being one of an emerging group of social networks to becoming the undisputed engine of the social networking phenomenon. Facebook is now the big shark in the tank because it is the main way for consumers to connect, engage, have fun and entertain themselves within a relatively easy to use platform. As Facebook pushes toward data dominance to make its platform worth bn, it almost has no choice but to jump the shark and hope that it can start a new, profitable revenue model. In doing so, will Facebook’s equity as a valued social network erode into an untrusted marketing platform of ads and spammers? Marketers and “Judy Consumer” have a lot at stake by having so much information in the hands of so young a company. Come join this discussion as we open the pandora’s box of privacy, trust, access and creating real consumer value.

Scientology protests. Gaming Time Magazine's Most Important People poll. Sending Justin Bieber to North Korea. 4chan is "the internet hate machine" that crosses boundaries with the real world. 4chan's two unusual features - it's anonymity and its lack of archiving - have made it into a hotbed of creativity that is almost single-handedly responsible for every major internet meme in the past 7 years. In this presentation, we will use 4chan as a lens to illustrate how modern advertising can better communicate with hyper-connected, hyper-social communities. By following the lead of the 4chan community (albeit with less pornography), advertisers can learn how to hack the attention economy and succeed in the face of changing consumer behaviors.

This session is about how the history of Print Design is becoming an important influence in the evolution of Interaction Design. As a craft, design for printed media has a rich history. Several generations of designers have pushed its boundaries in countless directions. It has been shaped over several hundred of years as both a functional and aesthetic discipline, with a deep foundation of principles, practices, theories, and professional dialogue. In comparison, Interaction and UI Design is still a relatively young field. Its history has largely been driven by technology and functional goals. The dialogue around it has been centered on usability, which has been its purpose in the context of technological advancement. The visual language of UI has evolved from that standpoint: that it should evoke the familiar, analog experience of tools, buttons, knobs, and dials. That foundation has led to a very specific visual language in interactive experiences. In the past ten years however, the relevant technologies that support the design of Interfaces - displays, processing speeds, and rendering engines - have matured to a point that they provide a more capable canvas for design. Meanwhile, our culture has become visibly more comfortable with the technologies that surround it.

The iPad and its entourage of Android tablets have introduced a new style of computing, confronting designers with unfamiliar aches and pains. Learn the symptoms (and fixes) for a range of new-to-the-world iPad interface ailments, including Greedy Pixel Syndrome, the dreaded Frankeninterface, and the "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" bait and switch. Explore practical techniques and eye-opening gotchas of tablet interface design, all grounded in the ergonomics, context, psychology, and nascent culture of these new devices (both iOS and Android). The presentation inoculates you against common problems with close-up looks at successful iPad apps from early sketches to final design. Genial bedside manner is administered by Josh Clark, author of the O'Reilly books "Tapworthy: Designing Great iPhone Apps" and "Best iPhone Apps: A Guide for Discriminating Downloaders."

A social network that functions like a colony of ants. A database that manages and shares information like a slime mold. What can we learn from the obvious? Millions of years of royalty free R&D embedded in nature holds the answers to many of today’s human centered design challenges. In this presentation learn how a systems approach that mimics nature’s lessons and resiliency can be adapted to technology design. Biomimicry is a proven design process that asks nature for advice. The application of biomimicry is responsible for the development of successful products ranging from Velcro™ and photovoltaic solar panels to advanced seawater desalination methods and more efficient Japanese bullet trains. Bringing a biologist to the design table to explore innovation in IT application development and optimization can unlock new discoveries. When approached as mentor, model and measure, organisms and whole systems found in the natural world become powerful collaborators.

How is social media changing the TV experience for good? Over the past ten years, we've seen television become truly interactive, from SMS voting on American Idol to real-time audience feedback via Twitter and Facebook becoming a part of everything from CNN to Oprah to Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. At the same time, web series have built millions of viewers on places like YouTube, iTunes, and XBox Live. Now a new wave of always-connected mobile apps, set-top boxes, and gaming platforms are making entertainment more social, location-aware, and connected than ever. Our panel of producers of hit TV shows and top web platforms will talk about how they're enabling social viewing and collaboration between producers, stars, and audiences in real time to create new kinds of TV experiences.

He brought us The Web Standards Project, A List Apart, Designing With Web Standards, A Book Apart, and so much more. Now legendary blogger, designer, and creative gadfly Jeffrey Zeldman brings us a SXSW panel. There will be discussion. There will be special guests. Quotable insights will fly faster than your fingers can peck them into Twitterific.

Christopher "moot" Poole is the founder of 4chan.org, a simple image-based bulletin board, which has grown from a niche site targeting anime fans to one of the most influential communities on the 'Net. With over 12 million unique visitors per month, many popular viral videos, Internet phenomena, and memes get their start on 4chan.

The future of entertainment is one of uncertainty and opportunity. As traditional formats like television and movies lose eyeballs to video games and user-generated content, where is this creative revolution taking us? Join one of leading voices in scripted internet content, Felicia Day, in discussing the journey that took her from a video shot in her garage to a four season production deal with Xbox and Sprint. She will speak about harnessing social media to build her show "The Guild" to over 100 million views, and building upon her success to produce her upcoming web series with EA/Bioware, "Dragon Age: Redemption". There has never been a better time to be an independent creator, learn from one of the innovators.

The last decade was the decade of social. The coming one will be the decade of games. Over the past years, a few key companies have built, and now maintain, a powerful framework to foster digital connections between our friends, family and colleagues. What comes next is another framework, not another social layer, but a "game layer". And it'll be even bigger. Instead of trading in social connections, the game layer traffics directly in human motivation. It's not about the number of followers you have, or how many people "like" you, but about how you can leverage game mechanics to achieve all sorts of great things. Use them cleverly and they can enhance education, empower local businesses and make your life more fun and more rewarding. Use them incorrectly and well... it's less good. Join Seth Priebatsch for a deep dive into the coming game layer, what to be excited about, what to fear and why your life is about to become a lot more fun.

New opportunities for sophisticated in-store and digital interactive experiences are fundamentally changing the way retail stores connect with their customers. These changes – from interactive kiosks, sophisticated mobile devices, digital & interactive vending machines, and the wireless delivery of software - are creating opportunities for brands and marketers to connect and interact with their customers more richly. We will share how are clients are leveraging these tools, and our vision of where it is all going.

Ever wonder why Google isn't very helpful in finding something fun to do tonight? Search engines have gotten really good at finding information that literally matches our keywords, but they fall short when our needs and priorities are either hard to express or hard to match directly to the target content. These limitations are giving rise to a new set of search experiences based on semantic understanding and recommendations that are personal, social, and contextual. Companies like Netflix, Yelp and Pandora have kicked off the first wave of new search. By focusing on searching by how we naturally think, talk and feel about the matter at hand, we can begin to find information that's relevant to us both logically and emotionally. In this panel, we will look at the emerging technologies and user experiences that are creating the next big thing for the search industry.

A core conversation with experts in the trenches about managing risk and exploiting opportunity in the world of interactive online media. The discussion will highlight and take a practical look at some of the various legal issues that impact interactive online services big and small, such as litigation, financing, monetization, contracts, content rights clearance, cyber-security, and privacy concerns.

We will focus on examples of how mobile devices are bringing healthcare to underserved communities in rural Africa. How can we diagnose pneumonia with a machine hooked up to a cell phone? How does a glowing pill bottle and a cellphone connection ensure that 85% of people take their HIV drugs in South Africa? And, what can the US learn about these experiments vis-a-vis privacy, rural access, and cost containment.

The business plan, as a tool to lure potential investors, secure early customers, and guide the direction of your business, is a dying construct. Smart entrepreneurs realize that a prototype is worth a thousand business plans. This panel will focus on prototypes as a tool to accelerate the success of your business, and will have a particular emphasis on the role of prototyping in business modeling, fund raising, product development, and sales. We'll talk specifically about how prototyping can allow you to more efficiently allocate resources (both talent, time and money), discover customers’ unmet needs, outsmart the competition, and move potential investors from interested to infatuated.

Are you curious about the new brain game design industry? **Have you explored the options of including a neuroscientist on your team of interactive and immersive media designers? Today, interactive and immersive media design draws on contemporary neuroscience to leverage the best odds of playing "somatosensory," "memory," "dopamine reward” and “inhibitory control” systems in the human brain and extended nervous system. From animated narrative scripting to skill building brain games or “apps”, functional knowledge of the human brain gives the 21st media designer an edge in working across the spectrum of interactive and immersive game media. This session starts with two simple, critical questions: What does neuroscience and cognitive science hold for the future of interactive and immersive media design? How can media designers prepare now for a future where "brain smart" games will be the means by which we learn, play, invent and transform lives through interactive media? Join us and find out.

As the film industry digs deep into the world of comics and graphic novels for source material, how do writers, directors and producers assess the best way to get it to the screen to entice fanpeople and newbies alike? For some of the indie, more idiosyncratic books, how do you retain that uniqueness while broadening access to it? Director/writer/producer Robert Rodriguez (“Frank Miller’s Sin City”) and comics creator/writer Greg Rucka (“Whiteout”) will discuss the challenges and pleasures in going from panel to screen.

The centerpiece of the urban lifestyle is an extensive, reliable public transportation system. Transit riders are embracing smartphones, 3G, 4G and even tablets. These tools can help us get better information, faster. Learn what changes are giving information in real-time and for trip planning. The New York City Office of Emergency Management (OEM) created NotifyNYC in 2009 "to enhance NYC's emergency public communications to the public." NotifyNYC allows NYC residents to sign up for transit notifications in a format of their choice, SMS, email, voice recording, Twitter or RSS for any or all boroughs. San Francisco's Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) website offers developers a huge amount of resources including a comprehensive API with schedules, station information and real-time service updates. This panel will examine creative new projects that enhance our lives as city residents on the go, including how these websites and applications could reduce costs, bureaucracy and response time in public transit.

Google is the web's most popular search engine. Being listed well in Google can generate hundreds, thousands or even millions of visits per week. But for many, it's a mystery about how and why Google ranks one site over another. Meanwhile, Bing "powers" results at both Bing and Yahoo, making it another important traffic source. In this session, representatives from both companies answer questions about how they list and rank web sites. Get your search engine optimization (SEO) questions answered directly from the companies that list you.

Over the last four years, TED has evolved from a 1,000-person conference to something much larger ... TED Talks have been viewed more than 400 million times worldwide, and are available in 80 languages, thanks to volunteer translators. And over the last two years, more than 1000 independently organized "TEDx" events have been held worldwide, in 100 countries and 50 languages. What's enabled this growth? In this presentation, we'll share the details of how TED has opened up, and what this has meant from both a business perspective, a content perspective and a technology perspective. We'll also take a look ahead, with some you-heard-it-first-at-SXSW news.

Do your 500 "friends" on social networks really know what you will like? How many of your friends' shared links that you click each day are interesting to you? The social graph brings trust and meaning to the web, but often creates information overload from over-sharing. And because real-time updates and feeds emphasize recency over relevance, rare gems often fall through the cracks. This talk will discuss the issues and considerations when designing a personalized discovery engine, one that combines the social, peer and taste graphs to produce relevant, peer-sourced recommendations and serendipitous discovery of new online content. StumbleUpon CEO Garrett Camp will go over the concepts and mechanisms behind such recommendation systems, and highlight findings from analysis of StumbleUpon's database of over 15 billion personalized stumbles.

With nearly 2 billion people online worldwide and the potential for online startups to become the next big thing overnight, companies must be prepared to handle the massive amounts of traffic they strive to acquire. However, not everyone with an idea for a potentially successful website is a network engineer. This panel will inform those who run startups, or companies that are thinking about changing their infrastructure strategy, about the latest options for building out the networks from multiple executives who have had success with the options on both ends of the spectrum, hand build servers to 100% in the cloud. Panelist will discuss options in infrastructure housing, such as: in-house, outsourced or in the cloud. They will also address the pros and cons of each, what kind of business models will benefit the most from which network configuration, and the immediate and long-term costs involved.

As individuals and companies across the world rely more and more heavily on social media, data visualization has become sine qua non in not only displaying analytics and metrics, but also in understanding macro and micro trends by platform, network and individual. This panel will explore information design, data visualization, relationship mapping and statistics -- and how they all fit together to create compelling infographics, data visualizations and dynamic dashboards in hot pursuit of the holy grail of information design: make it more digestible and more human. Proposed by well-known data visualization firm JESS3 (see especially: The Conversation Prism and The State of the Internet), the panel will not only share insights into what makes a good infographic or social media data visualization, but also seek to explore the significance of these graphics in relation to the expanding reach and uses of social media as not just tellers of social media stories, but part of larger content-based communications strategies.

Markets are conversations. As the web continues its neverending voyage toward Social, indie merchants must learn to engage and interact with their existing and future customers in new ways. The era of Social Shopping has begun, so get the info you need to stay ahead of the curve. Learn how to take advantage of the social web to help your indie business make more sales, connect with your community, and build devoted followers around the world. Perfect for small business owners, artists, crafters, musicians, authors and anyone else with something to sell.

Every two years Architecture for Humanity changes the design world to tackle a global project. In 2005 we looked at health care delivery in Sub-Saharan Africa. In 2007 looked to develop digital inclusion facilities in developing nations, leading to the building of the SIDAREC community resource center in Nairobi. In 2009 we invited architects around the world to design the classroom of the future in partnership with students and teachers. Schools are currently being developed and built in Haiti, Uganda and the United States. In 2011, given that the most sustainable building is already built, we will look at re-purposing decommissioned military facilities. This includes one of the most high profile facilities in the world. In this talk we will present this program, its' aims and objectives as well as other open source architectural programs from Architecture for Humanity.

Based on lessons learned during research for the #1 New York Times bestseller, The 4-Hour Body, this session will look at how to systematically hack the human body. From losing 100 pounds to running 100 miles, lifting 500 pounds or holding your breath for 5 minutes -- what are the limits? From screw-ups (emergency surgery, anyone?) to importing stem-cell growth factor from Israel for black market injections, Tim will discuss the promises, pitfalls, and methods of cutting-edge self-experimentation.

Worldwide introduction of Guy's new book. This presentation is for people who have a great product or service but not a lot of money. Learn how to enchant people using word-of-mouth marketing, Twitter, Facebook, and presentations so that they become your raging, inexhorable thunderlizard evangelists.

The “Elevation of Black Women in New Media” panel will consist of 4-5 successful web entrepreneurs coming together to help new media websites and/or blogs targeted to women of color help take their blog/website to the next level. Though all of the websites/blogs seem to have had some increase in traffic and garnered some acknowledgement – most do not have the skills, resources or proper knowledge to take their site to the next level. Currently there has not been one black blog/website ran by and for black women that has been VC or Angel funded. This panel will give attendees the opportunity to hear successful tools, tactics, how-to's, resources, lessons learned and guidance on how to get off the discouraging wheel most black women on the web continue to run on.

Google, via its rich snippets, has reported that microformats has a 94% usage share (as compared with RDFa etc.). So how does the future look for microformats? In this session, we'll look closely at real problems with implementing microformats in HTML5 and how this can be done, and whether there will be a continuing place for them. We'll also look at emerging technologies and techniques, such as RelMeAuth and discuss advanced user techniques. As Microformats passes through it's 5th birthday, we'll discuss the highs and lows of the project.

Is your legal team hindering your social media success? Is someone redlining every blog post, tweet, and comment you compose, costing you valuable time, sterilizing your messages, and taking the “social” out of “social media?” In a court of law, is there really a difference between the words “I’m sorry” and “I regret?” Join a panel of career apologists and apologetic lawyers to understand what the legal risks of saying “I’m sorry” really are, how companies like Southwest Airlines get away with it every day, and how to craft an air-tight apology.

Susan Crawford is a Visiting Research Collaborator at Princeton’s Center for Information Technology Policy. Susan co-led the FCC Agency Review team for the Obama-Biden transition (11/08-1/09), and served as Special Assistant to the President for Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy (2009). She teaches internet law and communications law, and is a member of the boards of Public Knowledge and TPRC. She was a member of the board of directors of ICANN from 2005-2008 and is the founder of OneWebDay. One of Fast Company’s Most Influential Women in Technology (2009); IP3 Awardee (2010), World Technology Network Awardee (2010); one of Prospect Magazine’s Top Ten Brains of the Digital Future (2011).

Influential people, from journalists and entrepreneurs to investors and developers are idea-generators shaping the ideas we drool over and discuss et infinitum. But who are these people leading the charge? How did they come to be, and rise above the rest to gather a following? Sites like Twitter and Facebook are now testing grounds for quantifying the world’s leaders. But do we understand what influence means and what variables are really at play? We all know that a follower count means nothing, but what does a RT mean? Or better yet, what does an @reply by Scoble mean vs. one from Arrington? Beneath the surface is where the science gets really interesting. In this panel you’ll hear from the experts who are distilling influence down to it’s basic components. They’ll explain tips for increasing influence, which variables really matter and the types of influence they are discovering across the web.

Promoted by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade together with the Secretary of State for Telecommunications, Ficod was set up in 2007. Its organisation was entrusted to Red.es and its purpose, within the framework of the Avanza Plan, is to develop and boost the Spanish Digital Content Industry, with special emphasis on Spanish speaking markets.

Social media is becoming an essential tool for activists in repressive societies. In 2009 the Iranian government expelled foreign media and jammed international broadcasts. For the BBC's Persian TV emails, video, Twitter and Facebook postings from Iran became the main source of news. Groundbreaking stories were complied using material from viewers and listeners. In the Xingjian province of China government censors were defeated by a tweet - news of a popular uprising amongst the regions Uighurs in this remote province leaked out to the world's media. A military clampdown ensued, but not before foreign media got to the region and heard the Uighurs grievances. Conversely the oppressors use the same social media tools, partly to spread disinformation about their activities, but also in the cases of groups such as the Taliban, to push their beliefs. The panel will discuss how censorship and suppression is made more and more difficult to hide by the social media revolution, and the impact of this for traditional media organizations.

The United States consumes more energy than it produces and is the second biggest emitter of CO2 in the world (behind China). If the United States truly chooses to become a greener country, then major improvements in our infrastructure (buildings and transportation) will have to be made. The green movement in the United States has yet to reach a tipping point. Companies either do not know how to lower their energy consumption and carbon footprint, or they are not implementing the projects fast enough. Fortunately, there are signs that we are now more green than ever. This panel will highlight three companies that you probably haven't heard of that are implementing green strategies.

At kids soccer games around the country, hyperconnected Dads tweet about trivia to pass the time. Meanwhile, as you walk into a supposedly social event, people all around you pull out their devices to "check in" on Foursquare or Gowalla. Through the night, people continue sharing their real feelings and thoughts not with the person in front of them but to their audience of "followers" on Twitter, making a real life social event feel decidedly ANTI-social. Sound familiar? As technology allows us to share every moment instantaneously online, are we missing out on what is right in front us? And if so, is the only solution to turn our gadgets off, or is there some imaginary line of balance that we can strike? This session will explore those questions, and the anti-social path that our always-connectedness may be leading us towards. Most importantly, we’ll try to uncover how you might fight back and reclaim your humanity from the social media bubble around you.

I'm the author, artist, and founder behind the one man operation known as The Oatmeal (http://theoatmeal.com). In less than a year, my website has grown to nearly 5 million unique visitors a month, I got a book deal, appeared on TV, and was named one of the best blogs of 2010 by Time Magazine. This presentation will cover a ton of examples of my work, explaining how and why they were virally successful. It includes tips, tools, and the process for generating and promoting viral content.

The public infrastructure of our cities are obscure structures whose workings are not accessible to most citizens. What if every sensor in our cities would have a Web API anyone could access in real-time and mashup? Open and easy to use Web platforms that enable efficient integration, processing, storage, and access to the enormous amount of data digital cities generate are increasingly needed, and we'll explore the various technologies that are making such solutions possible. Furthermore, we'll go much more beyond the technical aspects of such a platform to address the more controversial implications of such an Orwellian scenario. Hopefully, this session will provide a forum for the different disciplines involved in the design of future cities to establish a common ground for better interdisciplinary cooperation and understanding in this area.

Tribalism has become a new buzz concept for social networking, but what is a tribe really? In this panel we will explore what Native Americans know about tribal systems and what holds them together, motivates membership and how to tap into that to support or create lasting tribes. There are 3 fundamental components: leadership, vision and ritual that can be the basis for tribal identification.

After the SXSW love-fest, startups and advertisers will want to collaborate. Warning: it’s not easy. This panel will break down the cultural and organizational barriers between startups and brands, and we'll discuss a model for mutually beneficial relationships. We’ll address questions like: How should startups pitch a brand? Can startups really stay true to their product roadmap while accommodating the needs of advertisers? How can brands work with startups to generate buzz and stay relevant with consumers?

In a highly-anticipated return to SXSW, an all-star lineup of designers, coders, and entrepreneurs compete to pitch their worst business ideas in short lightning rounds. Winner gets funded by a real VC.

The Web has changed your life, your death and what you leave behind. Your heirlooms like photos, videos and letters are now stored in digital form and - in many cases - on servers that you don't own like those of Flickr, YouTube and Gmail. What should happen to your "legacy" data? With over 285,000 Facebook users set to die this year, you really should think about it. The Internet generation is coming of age and this issue is only growing. We have to respond with new legal frameworks and standards to support this change. The good news is that entrepreneurs, attorneys, archivists and scholars are already working on solutions. Join us to learn what happens to your digital life after you die and what's being done to give you a say in it.